A California state bill has emerged as a flashpoint between those who think AI should be regulated to ensure its safety and those who see regulation as potentially stifling innovation. The bill, which heads to its final vote in August, is sparking fiery debate and frantic pushback among leaders from across the AI industry—even from some companies and AI leaders who had previously called for the sector to be regulated.
The legislation, California Senate Bill 1047, has taken on added significance as efforts to regulate AI at the federal level have proved elusive in a presidential election year. It aims to put guardrails on the development and use of the most powerful AI models by mandating that developers comply with various safety requirements and report safety incidents.
The amped-up discourse and lobbying over the California bill, which passed the state’s Senate in May 32-1 and heads to a final vote in August, has reached a crescendo over the past few weeks. The state senator who introduced the bill, Scott Wiener, recently told Fortune he likens the fight, which has seen AI safety experts pitted against some of tech’s top venture capitalists, to the ‘Jets vs Sharks’—Silicon Valley meets West Side Story.
